Nothing. Watched the Pros and Elites start. Ate two gels about 30-ish minutes before my wave.

Swim

31m 50s

1500 meters

02m 07s / 100 meters

Comments:

Holy crap, this was just about the worst swim of my short career.
It was roughly 200m to the first turn buoy, and before I was even half way to it I could see that I was being left in the dust by everyone else. I'm honestly not sure how or where I went wrong, but seeing my time - I just don't know WTF happened. I was 6 minutes slower than AG Nats. Does a wetsuit make THAT much of a difference???

What would you do differently?:

Go Fasterrrr!!!

Transition 1

02m 10s

Comments:

No wetsuit on the swim means no suit to fight in T1. Yay!
I think that I executed this one pretty well. I could have moved faster and this is definitely a place where not having shoes pre-clipped added time.

What would you do differently?:

Not much. I'm content with this one, and my time compares favorably to others in the event.

Bike

1h 10m 5s

24.85 miles

21.27 mile/hr

Comments:

Driving this course the day before, I was kinda like "WTF??". It looked hilly as hell on the further out parts near the airport. During the race, however, it turned out that we had tailwinds to help us up those hills when heading out, and the headwinds on the way back didn't seem too terrible. Screwed up one downhill because I mistakenly thought we had to make a 90-degree turn at the bottom of it when we actually went straight. I didn't realize it until I was halfway down, so I lost a little momentum there by not taking it as fast as I could have.

At one point, on the biggest individual climb of the course on the way out, there was a group of spectators in costumes, with signs, cow bells, etc... on my way up the hill I high fived a guy dressed in a Gumby costume, the CleanBottle guy, and some other random stranger. It was a lot of fun :)

Overall, I executed fairly well in terms of staying within myself and not burning out. I approached the entire race as "a training day with a finisher's medal", so to be kind of taking it easy a little bit and still turn in this time, I am pleased.

I need to re-think my Perpetuem use, however, as I had Perpetuem burps on the run. I don't know if it was too many calories, or drinking too late into the bike... but it tasted nasty the second time around.

Transition 2

02m 4s

Comments:

Did not take my feet out of the shoes on the bike, so I gave up some time there.
Helmet came off and shoes went on quick. The race belt was slow going on, but that's it. Grabbed my little handheld water bottle and headed to Run Out.

What would you do differently?:

Nothing. It was a HUGE transition area, so this time isn't all that terrible.

Run

52m 8s

6.2 miles

08m 25s min/mile

Comments:

Not my best run, but not my worst, either. I would actually call this average for me, lately.
For as much as the Run is where I continue to put in the most work in what little training I do, this is where I seem to continue to need the most work.

Given my goals for the day, however, I'm quite ok with this. I executed a bike & run that, while not OLY fast, I think I can replicate the efforts this weekend at my Half.... which is a far more important goal for me.

What would you do differently?:

I need to start doing race-pace work. I think that I've kinda hit a plateau with Zone 2 stuff.

Post race

Warm down:

The amount of food and schwag at this event was absolutely incredible. Fresh fruit, ice cream, ice cold drinks, and a whole tent area full of vendors giving away stuff. I grabbed my finishers medal and some water and then headed for a free massage. After that, I was all about methodically hitting every vendor for a few samples of whatever they were giving away :)

What limited your ability to perform faster:

I knew going into this event that I wasn't an actual competitor, so I took a longer view toward Rev3 CP this coming weekend, and beyond to B2B full, and instead chose to treat this event as a training day.

Perhaps in some future year I might get back to this event and be better suited to actually compete, but if nothing else, it was a great first-class experience.

Event comments:

Race start was delayed due to some freakish weather blowing through early on.

Nice work out there Chris. We probably saw each other a few times and didn't realize it. I had people saying hello to me that I had no idea who they were. There were quite a few people there from Kansas, I think a lot more people remember me than I do them. Agree, great SWAG, great race. Maybe see you there next year.

Everyone I've talked to said that the swim was sooooo slooooow. I did not know how wetsuit dependent I was until this race. It was still a fun race though. The rain added a little element of distraction to a way to early morning, but we all had a great day to compete.

Most memorable moments: Gumby for sure. Guy wearing a speedo, cape, drinking PBR, asking me to "tag him in". The guys on the run handing out weddng cake. Some guy also was racing me on his Schwinn Fixie up a hill. He was on the grass and I think drunk, but hell, it was awesome.

Everyone I've talked to said that the swim was sooooo slooooow. I did not know how wetsuit dependent I was until this race. It was still a fun race though. The rain added a little element of distraction to a way to early morning, but we all had a great day to compete.

Most memorable moments: Gumby for sure. Guy wearing a speedo, cape, drinking PBR, asking me to "tag him in". The guys on the run handing out weddng cake. Some guy also was racing me on his Schwinn Fixie up a hill. He was on the grass and I think drunk, but hell, it was awesome.

See you next year maybe!!

Matt

The rain that morning was CRAZY! When the automatic door at the hotel entrance opened as I was walking out, I was blasted by what looked and felt like a hurricane! I was pretty much amazed that no bike racks were blown over and my bike was where I left it.

The folks in costume on that hill, and the people on the run course partying with the boombox on the one bridge were great! So much fun and it was great to be in a frame of mind where I could have fun with all of them and not be all "serious" focused.